


To Hear the Words

by aeriamamaduck



Series: TES AUs [1]
Category: Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Drunkenness, Eventual Romance, F/M, First Meetings, Growing Up, Hurt/Comfort, POV Multiple, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-24
Updated: 2016-07-24
Packaged: 2018-07-26 09:56:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7569703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeriamamaduck/pseuds/aeriamamaduck
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first words Martin's soulmate would speak to him included a name. Minerva Saturnius. </p><p>A look into their separate lives as they wonder about the person whose words are written on their skin before their fateful meeting in a burning city.</p>
            </blockquote>





	To Hear the Words

He was sixteen when the words carved a burning trail in the skin of his right arm.

**_I am Minerva Saturnius. Come with me. You’re in danger._ **

It had been worrying his father that no words had appeared throughout his childhood, and now it turned out that he _knew_ what his soulmate’s name was. That was a rarity. She would be younger than he was, but would supposedly know that he was in danger. Maybe she’d save him from this danger.

“Gods’ blood, what danger could this be?” his father asked, anxious eyes looking at the damning words on Martin’s arm.

.

_Minerva began to cry inconsolably one afternoon when she was two years old._

_The sound and sight were horrible. Some wondered what could cause such grief to a toddler. Petronella’s nerves were frayed as she paced the room, patting her daughter’s back in an effort to comfort her. She had a clue as to the cause of Minerva’s pain, and it was nothing from her immediate environment. No, the usually content child was getting a sense of her soulmate’s agony, some strong emotion that could drive a little girl to fevered tears._

_“At least the words haven’t faded,” Gaius had said grimly, callused fingers tracing he prophetic words on Minerva’s pudgy arm. Vanishing words usually meant the speaker had died. These words were still there, clear as day:_

**_I heard about how you helped the guard drive the daedra back. Well done._ **

_Petronella had gasped sharply upon seeing the words shortly after Minerva’s birth, wanting a grand future for her child but never dreaming of something so…amazing. The words on her wrist were simple by comparison, appearing when she was a happy two-year-old in the arms of both of her parents. **Sit here next to me** , they said, and Gaius had spoken them to her on that first day in the orphanage. When she quietly thanked him he rolled back his sleeve to show those words on his wrist._

_Minerva, however, would have to face some kind of otherworldly danger before meeting her soulmate. She had to be strong enough to survive it._

_For now Petronella could only hope to hush her daughter’s breathless sobs, hoping the soulmate got over their pain quickly. No more, she thought. Minerva can’t take it._

.

Martin bandaged his forearm the first few times, feigning injury and favoring the limb as if any harsh movement caused him pain. Better to hold back during his trysts than face an awkward stop if his partner noticed the woman’s name glaring at them from his arm.

Then, in a drunken haze, he got tired of the effort.

“That’s your soulmate’s _name_? Minerva Satur--”

He silenced their queries with deep kisses, bringing their hands back to his body, and thanking his stars that whoever this girl was she caused him no grief.

In rare moments of guilt he wondered if he had extended her that same courtesy. His father’s death had filled him with an agony he never thought he’d feel, along with rage at his inability to do _anything_ to stop it. He stared at the words on his forearm, wondering for the thousandth time about Minerva Saturnius. Wondering if he’d ever feel an emotion so real that somehow came from leagues away.

Friends lucky enough to have met their soulmates described the experience to him: _I couldn’t eat, couldn’t move, couldn’t stop crying. It felt like someone was standing on my chest. When I could finally move I went to find him. It was the day he got a letter saying his sister died._

He sighed raggedly, not wanting to think about Minerva Saturnius or whatever danger she would claim he was in.

The power offered in these revels were a much more pleasant thought, and he filled his goblet enough times that he thought he’d eventually forget Minerva Saturnius’s name on his forearm.

Until it stared him in the face when he woke up in the morning, his head pounding.

.

_One night when she was nine years old, Minerva awoke screaming in fear._

_She hugged her right arm to her chest, sharp sobs wracking her body as a myriad of emotions violently clawed through her. Terror, loss, shame, all of it making her curl up in a tight ball in her bed, wishing it would all end._

_What had happened? What was happening to them?_

_Her father burst into the room, shaking her by the shoulder. “What’s wrong? Minerva, stop screaming! What is it?!”_

_“I don’t know!” she sobbed,_ _getting away from her father’s grip and tugged the blanket over her head, burying her face in her pillow and screaming as hard as she could. The fear and guilt were rolling in her stomach to the point where she had to retch over the side of the bed, her father wordlessly laying a hand on her shaking back._

_People in the market marveled at the words on her arm, telling her that she was bound to be a great hero, all while ruffling her hair. She didn’t feel like a hero when some unexplainable feeling made her cry like a baby, and she could feel her father’s confusion prickling the back of her neck. He and mother told her that it was probably her soulmate making her feel like this, that the same thing had happened when she was two years old._

_Whoever this soulmate was she hated them. She didn’t want anyone who made her stomach hurt like this. Like she was the one who’d done something terrible._

.

He was in the middle of his prayers when it happened.

Rage, fear, and powerlessness surged in him, his heart racing and a cold sweat drenching him as he shakily got to his feet and quickly made his way to the undercroft, hoping Ilav didn’t notice him and start ask questions.

Once alone he took long, deep breaths to calm his stomach and the fury lying beneath the surface. It didn’t work, and the line became blurred between his anger and the foreign sensation that had caused everything.

 _Minerva Saturnius,_ he thought, rolling back his sleeve and gazing at her name. He remembered once being grateful that she had never made him incoherent with whatever devastating emotion she felt, and cursed himself for his thoughtlessness. He did not want to imagine what she’d gone through on that awful night when his friends lay dead around him and he stood at the center of everything, holding the Sanguine Rose in his sweating palms.

Nearly two years before he’d felt a melancholy so great that not even the close presence of the gods could comfort him. Realizing that it was not _his_ emotions he knew that they came from her, and he understood that all-encompassing need to run and comfort, to make everything right.

More than once in the past eight years he had traced the letters of her name, wondering how Minerva Saturnius could have been so unlucky as to have a soulmate as wretched as he.

Now he clutched his wrist in his left hand, gritting his teeth with anger at his or her helplessness, he didn’t know anymore. Whether or not he ever met her, he wanted her safe, and something had gone horribly wrong.

The day passed and the tumult remained, Martin sitting by candlelight and staring at his forearm, praying the words stayed visible as they always were. The next morning was better, and the words were still there. Martin sighed in relief and thought everything would return to normal.

Days passed before the screams began.

.

_She was exhausted, making her way past frightened people towards the altar, the night’s events driving all other thoughts from her mind. She needed to prepare, had to ready herself before facing more daedra. She fell to her knees before the altar and murmured soft prayers, praying for strength and endurance, and to not let her fear or anyone else’s hold her back._

_Minerva heard soft footsteps behind her and looked over her shoulder. A moment later she gasped and got to her feet, recognizing his face. She stared at him and it was as if she was looking at a younger version of the man she’d watched die in the Imperial Prison. The Emperor’s son. Martin._

_The priest smiled at her, tired eyes filled with sadness, and said in a soft voice, “I heard about how you helped the guard drive the daedra back. Well done.”_

_It felt like her heart stopped in her chest, her right arm tingling with warmth as she realized just what he’d said to her. Her world had already been turned on its head and this was just one more unbelievable occurrence in these past eventful days. How could the Emperor be her soulmate? She swallowed and forced herself to look at the man, resisting the urge to embrace him like her heart wanted her to. Who was he? Was he the one responsible for the sadness, those painful tears? All of the sense of failure? That rush of contentment that would sometimes overcome her and she felt such peace?_

_Her voice shaky she placed her hand on her chest and said in a rush, “I am Minerva Saturnius. Come with me. You’re in danger.”_

_The smile faded from his face, shock replacing it as his blue-grey eyes looked at her. His left hand grasped his right forearm and opened his mouth, a shaking breath escaping him rather than whatever words he wanted to say._

_Her mouth was dry and her heart was racing like a rabbit, never imagining that this was how their meeting would go. When she was in the gate she had the vague thought that perhaps this would cause the meeting, then that was forgotten once she realized she needed to survive and destroy the gate. But here he was, and he’d said the words._

_She raised her arm and tugged back the worn leather to reveal the words, and his eyes fell on them._

_“…It’s you,” he said, raising his gaze to hers as he echoed her movements and rolled back his sleeve to reveal her own name on his skin._

_Her breath caught at the sight, at the thought that he knew her name before she knew his. “…Gods, it…it looks like I found you,” she said, her fingers reaching to trace her words. His hand touched hers, careful of the cuts and scrapes he found there._

_She held on to Martin’s gaze, finding peace and calm there in the midst of all the horror around them. Still she couldn’t forget why she was here in the first place. “I…can we talk somewhere, alone?”_

_His answering smile made her flush. “Yes, of course. We can talk about anything you want…” They made their way to the stairs leading to the undercroft, away from the other survivors. His gaze then filled with sorrow as his hand curled around hers. “I’m so sorry. For everything,” he said gravely._

_For everything, he said. “I’m glad you’re alright,” she said quietly, remembering the absolute agony she would experience. Agony she sometimes resented, but no longer._

_He smiled again and his thumb brushed across her knuckles. “So do I.” Then something flared in his eyes and he looked at her almost desperately, “A few days ago, I-I felt…You were being--”_

_Minerva gasped softly, never having thought that he’d be able to feel what Phillida had done to her. She quickly explained, “I’m fine, it was nothing. A…misunderstanding…”_

_“It wasn’t ‘nothing,’” he said darkly. “You were hurt.”_

_“It’s not important right now, anyway,” she said resolutely. “You’re in danger here, and I’ve come to get you out of Kvatch.”_

_His shoulders shook with bitter laughter. “I should’ve expected you’d turn up once this horror began, but I wasn’t thinking…”_

_Neither was she. She began, “It’s just…I was sent here to find a priest. You, specifically.”_

_“I don’t think I’ll be much help as a priest. I’m having trouble understanding the gods right now,” he said, looking at the collapsing tower and the broken windows. “If all this is part of a divine plan, I’m not sure I want to have anything to do with it.”_

_His doubt beat at her, but she could not let him give in to it. “Martin, please believe me. There is a plan and we’re part of it! I wouldn’t lie to you about this.”_

_Martin looked at her, then at their joined hands. “…No, you wouldn’t…It’s just that…I prayed to Akatosh through that terrible night, but no help came. Only more daedra…How can I make sense of this?”_

_She could only tell him the truth, as much as it would eventually hurt her. “You are Uriel Septim’s son.”_

_That almost shocked him as much as meeting her. “Emperor Uriel Septim? You think the Emperor is my father? No…you must have the wrong man. I am a priest of Akatosh…My father was a farmer…”_

_“I’m sorry,” she murmured, knowing how shaken his world was._

_“You don’t need to apologize for anything,” he said, another apology in his voice. “I think I believe you…”_

_Minerva smiled at those words, even if she was still frightened out of her mind by everything else that was happening. She would protect him, make sure they saw the end of this at least before asking themselves what would happen once he became Emperor._

_At least she’d found him. Saved him. She could be happy with that tonight._


End file.
